Page images
PDF
EPUB

of such order or injunction, 'the District Court ought to proceed to enforce obedience thereto, as in other cases of the violation of injunctions.' Chief Justice Parker, in reply to this intimation, while declaring the judgment of the court, took occasion to say that, if the plaintiff should ask the interference of the State court, it would be their duty to enjoin and prohibit the bankrupt and his assignees, the creditors and all claimants of the property attached, from attempting to procure any process from any court which was not acting under the authority of the State of New Hampshire, with a view to prevent the entry of judgment, in such suits, or to prevent the execution of the final process issued upon the judgments when obtained. And he added, 'If any such injunction is issued by us, in any case, it will be our duty to punish any infraction of it when brought to our notice, by prompt action,' etc. When it is considered that the point of variance between these courts grew out of the construction to be given to a single word made use of in a public statute in which the Legislature of New Hampshire were disposed to sustain the judgment of its own court, it was fortunate for the country that all occasion for a collision of jurisdiction was removed by a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in harmony with the views entertained by Chief Justice Parker."-Extract from Memoirs of the Hon. Joel Parker, LL. D. by Emory Washburn, Bussey Professor in Dane Law School.

THEOPHILUS PARSONS, MASSACHUSETTS.

(1750-1813.)

Chief Justice of Massachusetts. Born at Byfield, Massachusetts, February 24, 1750, died in Boston, October 30, 1813, aged sixty-three. Son of a Congregational clergyman. Educated at Dummer Academy and Harvard College, whence he graduated at nineteen. Admitted to the bar at Falmouth, Massachusetts, now Portland, Maine, 1774. When the British burned Falmouth, he returned to Byfield, where he found the learned and acute Judge Trowbridge domiciled in his father's house, and to association with whom he was wont to attribute his professional success. At thirty he married and removed to Newburyport, where he resided till 1800, when at the age of fifty he moved to Boston. Before this last removal he enjoyed an extensive practice, not confined to his State, but covering New England, and occasionally reaching into New York. In 1806, he became Chief Justice, giving up a $10,000 practice, and held the position till death.

He was intensely conservative by nature, and

though he powerfully aided in securing the adoption of the Federal Constitution by his State, being the author of three salient provisions therein, and wrote, prior to the event, the memorable pamphlet termed "The Essex Result," he had probably little aptitude or taste for politics. But in stirring times his meditative and studious temperament enabled him to devote himself to books and the development of his intellect. As a consequence he stands forth prominently from among his contemporaries as an acute and technical lawyer of scholarly attainments and culture, leading Judge Lowell to say: "While Parsons knew more law than any other man, he knew more of everything else than of law." And posterity has raised him to a very high pinnacle, indeed. His decisions, published separately during his life, as "Commentaries" on the law, have mostly been overruled or disregarded by the very bench from which they emanated-the natural fate of cases decided by an accomplished special pleader with the passing away of the system under which he practiced,

Hope.

"Hope is the grand catholicon for every evil but despair, and it is a remedy we are not easily deprived of."-Memoirs of Parsons, by Theophilus Parsons, Jr., p. 25.

Ministry.

"Never let a man think of being a minister unless he can quietly deny himself the enjoyment of life, and expect his reward only above stars."-Memoirs, p. 25.

Usurpation.

"An act of usurpation is not obligatory, it is not law; and any man may be justified in his resistance. Let him be considered as a criminal by the Government, yet only his own fellow-citizens can convict him. They are his jury; and if they pronounce him innocent, not all the powers of Congress can hurt him. And innocent they certainly will pronounce him, if the supposed law he resisted was an act of usurpation."— Remarks of Judge Parsons upon the adoption of the Federal Constitution by Massachusetts: Memoirs, p. 102.

The Political Ship.

"In the political ship there must be common seamen as well as pilots; and a mutiny of the crew may as effectually destroy her as a division among the officers."-His reply to those who wanted him to take the Attorney Generalship of the United States; Memoirs, 123.

Self Possession.

"The man who cannot be excited, and cannot be made to lose his self-command, has an immense advantage, in the simple fact that he is at all times fully possessed of all his own powers, and ready to take full advantage of every opportunity.”—Memoirs, p. 215.

His Religious Belief.

"I examined the proofs and weighed the objections to Christianity many years ago, with the accur acy of a lawyer; and the result was so entire a conviction of its truth, that I have only to regret that my belief has not more completely influenced my conduct."-Memoirs, p. 313.

Why We Should Support the Public Schools.

"You will not probably want these schools for your children, and possibly they will not want them for theirs; but many generations that succeed them. will be sure to need the schools for their own families, for they are in all probability to be poor. In this country the wheel of fortune not only may, but must, revolve; faster in some instances than in others, but turn it must. The rich of any generation are the descendants, and generally the immediate descendants, of the poor. Their descendants will in almost every case take their place among the poor, in one or two generations more; and because there are many more of the poor than of the rich, each family must num

« PreviousContinue »